And I have to move on. In more ways than one.

So I am.

Here.

I still remember vividly when you used to crawl up to me when I was asleep and start pulling my hair and my ears and my nose. Everyone showered so much attention on you, and even I couldn’t resist teasing you just to see how you would react. Of course, we were young back then, and we lived simpler lives, oblivious and carefree to the ways of the world. Times have changed. We grew up, we started knowing things, our innocence were lost.

Yet, all that knowledge and reasoning still couldn’t stop me from trying to shout reason into the ears of this stubborn, loud, impatient man that is my brother.

Why the anger? That’s the one thing that bugs me. It’s one thing to be curious and to always have an inquiring nature, but discretion is also a valuable virtue to be learnt. Rudeness and arrogance will not only get you nowhere, but you also run the risk of people misinterpreting you and assuming things about you which are far from the truth. And yet you never listen to what we say. You ask for our opinions, but you become impatient and furious with us when our opinions differ from your solution.

Continued here.

My father presents a dilemma in my life. To talk with him means to take all my principles and my beliefs and put them in the corner and listen to his explanation about whatever he feels like talking. To say what I feel about something means to incur his wrath. This has been the way I communicate with my father for the past few years, ever since I took the initiative to say what I mean. Obviously, this has not been very beneficial in our relationship. Calls home would be spent mostly talking to my mom, and conversations with my father would revolve around money and studies. This is normal among many families, apparently. 

Continued here.

Shit. I think I’m getting that feeling again. That sick feeling at the bottom of the stomach, that strange sensation you feel, as if you’re going to throw up, but can’t. You just want to somehow, because it’ll make you feel relieved, but it just would not happen, short of sticking your fingers into your mouth. and forcing yourself to throw up. It seems I have a strange fixation with throwing up, but that is what comes to mind when this sick feeling comes.

That’s funny. I haven’t felt like this in a while.

***

I seem to be going through life half-awake these past few days. The basic action of going to classes is something that I’m glad to say has become a habit, but it feels so hollow sometimes. Sitting at the back of the class, alternating between listening to the lecture and doodling. It’s not fulfilling at all. I look at the others. Some of them are so attentive that I sometimes envy them. To devote such an amount of focused, undivided attention at will is something that is just beyond me.

I can’t go on living like this.

***

Don’t mind me. It’s just a phase.
I hope.

There was a long line of parked cars when I finally got there. I had been searching for his house for almost 30 minutes, using the same roundabout three, maybe four times. Take this turning here, make a U-turn there. All these in a neighbourhood that I thought I knew; most of my school friends live here. I had never been to his house before; I never thought I would even be meeting him again. After SPM, contact got cut off, as most friendships do. Some times I would reminisce about the good times, and so I would try to call him, but the calls were not long. Maybe it’s because we had nothing in common to talk about anymore. Initiating a conversation about new things would bring about an air of formality and awkwardness. So, it was no more calls, “whatever la” and on with my life.

Then he called me up out of the blue and invited me to his 21st birthday party. It would be a big party and the whole of 5 Murni was invited. It was a pleasant surprise, truth be told. Sounds grand. I can meet the girls again. I always wondered how they were doing. But an opportunity to reunite with classmates would eventually bring about long-forgotten feelings. That was my fear. The fear that I would remember the things which I thought I had moved on from. That my life, 4 years down the road from Form 5, would be sidelined for the memories of an unfulfilling school life.

Continued here.